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Written by: Richard Condon (novel), Richard Condon and Janet Roach (screenplay)
Directed by: John Huston
Starring: Jack Nicholson, Kathleen Turner, Robert Loggia, Anjelica Huston, CCH Pounder
Rated: R
Watch the trailer
Plot
Two highly skilled mob assassins fall in love and are then hired to kill each other.
Verdict
The premise is nice enough, but the story never grabbed me. The romance seems fabricated solely to give the movie emotional punch. The events that unfold are contrived. Apparently this is a comedy. While the tone never quite made that clear, that does explain some of the more odd elements in the movie. It's never as funny nor as sharp as it wants to be. Understanding the goal of the movie makes me appreciate it more, but it's enough to change my opinion.
Skip it.
Review
I wasn't sure what this was going to be with the first sequence. We get a a proud dad after his son is born, a childhood Christmas where a boy gets brass knuckles, and then the same boy, presumably, is initiated into the Prizzi family.
This has been reviewed as a black comedy, but the humor of getting brass knuckles is sillier than anything else in the movie. Thinking of the movie from that perspective, it explains why the elderly Don Corrado is comically gaunt and frail. I did not realize this was a satire.
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| Jack Nicholson, Kathleen Turner play Charley, Irene |
The primary plot focuses on Charley (Jack Nicholson) who falls for Irene (Kathleen Turner) after seeing her at a wedding. He manages to meet her but doesn't find out her name. She later calls him, much to his elation. They quickly fall for each other in a whirlwind romance, but I didn't buy it. Their love seems tied to progressing the plot of the movie and not any underlying emotions or feelings.
Charley is a hit man for the mob. He's hired to kill Marxie, a guy that robbed a Prizzi casino. It just so happens that Marxie's girlfriend is Irene. That doesn't seem to bother Charley, and he buys the story that she knew nothing about the robbery, though he may be blinded by love. She does give him half the money Marxie stole, claiming he had brought a mysterious bag into the house.
Charley and Irene marry. When he gets another job, he uses his wife to help. She kills a witness that walks in on the murder. That witness happens to be a cop's wife. That brings heat on the family. One of the Don's sons wants to get rid of Charley, setting him up in a power play to get a promotion within the family due to Charley not recovering all of the money from Marxie. The son unknowing hires Charley's wife to kill him. Due to the murder of the cop's wife, the Prizzi family needs to make things right. They tell Charley he has to get rid of Irene. Two assassins are charged with killing each other.
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| Kathleen Turner, Jack Nicholson play Irene, Charley |
I didn't pick up on the fact this was supposed to be a comedy. I mistook the sillier parts of the movie as missteps. Viewing this as spoof on mafia movies does explain the plot elements, but the movie still falls into this liminal space. It's not funny enough to be an out and out comedy, and the satire isn't smart enough. It's not serious enough to be a typical crime movie. It seemed like a failure of tone. Even with the knowledge that this is comedic, it doesn't make the movie any more enjoyable.
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